Gibbs: HealthCare.gov not Auburn

Noted Auburn football fan Robert Gibbs says HealthCare.gov hasn’t quite made a 109-yard missed field goal return-caliber comeback, but it at least has a fresh set of downs to work with.

“I think the Obama administration should be glad that it appears to be first and 10 again. It’s no longer third and 35. I think we’re a long way away from a 109 yard field goal return,” Gibbs said Monday on MSNBC’s “Now with Alex Wagner.”

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The former White House press secretary was born and raised in Auburn, Ala., and was asked about the functioning of the Obamacare website after its Nov. 30 deadline — the same day that a seemingly miraculous return of a missed field goal propelled Auburn over its rival, Alabama.

“The front end of it is clearly in a much, much better state,” Gibbs said. “There’s two things that continue to be worrisome for the administration. One is identification verification, which is obviously crucially important in terms of subsidies that you qualify for. And the second and equally as important is the back end form, the 834 form, which is transmitted to the insurance company which actually is where enrollment happens.”

Gibbs said while the back end of the exchange site still needs to be resolved, the improvement in the user experience of the site was necessary to tackle first.

“This will continue to have to be improved as we go along,” Gibbs said. “Like I said, it’s first and 10. We’ve moved the chains. That doesn’t mean we’re anywhere close to being able to score on this. Because again, that back end has to be fully functioning.”

Dropping the football analogy, Gibbs said the best thing the White House can do moving forward with the site is to be honest, especially as the scope of the problems become clear.

“Sometimes the truth is the best way to go at it. And look, this has been a completely unnecessary embarrassment,” Gibbs said. “I thought that The New York Times piece this weekend about sort of how we got here and what had to happen to fix it was a very, very startling piece. And some people have said this, maybe the biggest thing we learned over the weekend was just how messed up this was and how badly it was messed up for so long.”

Ultimately, Gibbs thinks people will be fired for the rollout of the website and only believes so more after The New York Times article he referenced, he said.

“It will be inexplicable if somebody involved in the creation of the website doesn’t get fired or a group of people don’t get fired,” Gibbs said. “If you look at that New York Times story from this weekend, when folks at HHS are looking at the White House and Denis McDonough’s countdown calendar to the beginning of implementation and are looking at that derisively, or laughing, or thinking it’s micro-managing — I mean let’s be clear, if there’s one thing the White House didn’t do on this, they didn’t micro-manage bureaucracy enough.”

He said the “private-sector velocity” the administration touted in a report about the website’s progress applies to job security, as well.

“The private-sector velocity should also include the velocity of moving somebody’s framed pictures out of their office and into a new job,” Gibbs said.